Parenting

Recently, I've spent far too much time talking to my cat- I admit it- but I swear she's got more to say than the mums at the ballet grade 2 exam on Saturday. Nini's dance classes were instituted by her dad, and I follow along through blackmail, but her dance activities took up all of Saturday from 10 am to 3 pm, including a grade 2 ballet exam- a form of pure purgatory. Fuck 'Honey, We're Killing the Kids' - what about 'Kids, You're Killing Your Parents'?

I had to spend 40 minutes in a church shed waiting room with ambitious mums of 9 yr olds. "Remember to smile, dear", "Calm your nerves!", "Just do your best" they urged their alter-ego daughters. I told Nini to break a leg, and I meant it literally. Bad mum. Thankfully, she hasn't a nerve in her wee body, and has nothing invested in the exams but advancing a class. She demonstrated her dances in the Botanics this weekend, and she's knockout. I wish I had her poise and elegance.

During the RADA exam, I worked on a Sudoku while the other bonded mums talked over me of Kate Moss (she's not a real mum, she doesn't know what normal is), Camilla (Diana was a true princess), tecnology for fixing ballet buns (gel, snoods, hairbands, hairpins). This can only happen in Edinburgh, I truly hope, and it's quite stomach-churning.

Sudoku (quick, Monday's Independent, ): 21 mins. One worked from the outside of the grid inwards, with the 9's and 1's easy to place, but cross-correlation between central 5, 6, 8's, as is so often the case.